hold onto yourself,
she said,
find the edges of your being
that are lost in the wilderness.
make them yours again.
blog
-
21 words of lent
Wednesday, March 10th, 2010landscape of desire
Tuesday, March 9th, 2010
The installation that Jonny, Blythe and I are curating for the Adelaide Festival Fringe opened tonight. I think it’s a really beautiful space…
it’s open each night this week, between 7.30 and 9.30 at 12 Flinders St, Adelaide.
22 words of lent
Tuesday, March 9th, 2010i forget how hard it is
to remember to be humanto fail
to be fragiletomorrow i will not try harder
23 words of lent
Monday, March 8th, 2010i have nothing left.
I don’t feel anxious
or awful.There’s nothing in this that’s bad
or overwhelming.i just have nothing left.
24 words of lent
Monday, March 8th, 2010without guilt to make my choices
i lose my directionshould i lapse
just to know what to do?is there a third way?
25 words of lent
Sunday, March 7th, 2010i am so very grateful
for the people who make
any place
home
who honour the dislocated
and disconnected
moments of my days
with their love26 words of lent
Saturday, March 6th, 2010funny how writing 26 words
can be as intimidating
as a 20000 word thesis
[do the numbers count as well?
can i make that sentence longer?]27 words of lent
Thursday, March 4th, 2010is it naivety or blind optimism
that makes us long for the time
when it’s all better?i want the hope that lets me live with today.
28 words of lent
Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010I have learnt to live with despair
but my discipline this lent
is to live each moment,
so i must also trust the good
for what it is29 words of lent
Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010holding tight to the frayed and ripped remnants
of yesterday’s dreams
not to recreate them
in a false prayer for utopia
but to find again
the hope they held30 words of lent
Monday, March 1st, 2010In a week where everything will be difficult,
out of my control,
the most impossible task
will be to hold lightly
to expectations:it will be what it will be.
31 words of lent
Sunday, February 28th, 2010i am learning to love
what comes with being human:unexpected fragility, tangled with resilience;
limitations that frustrate
and expectations that are exceededi would finally have it no other way.
32 words of lent
Friday, February 26th, 2010in this week of chaos
and demands,
of pressured decisions
and responsibility,
today i fall back
into the gift
of lent:i am mortal
i am made to be dispensablethank god.
33 words of lent
Thursday, February 25th, 2010i no longer seek god
because in the seeking of god
i lose sight of who i ami seek to be human
and any god worth their while
will come find me34 words of lent
Wednesday, February 24th, 2010these are the words i said
instead of those i needed to say:i am bored with lent already
these are the words i needed to say:i am scared i am not enough
35 words of lent
Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010silence
/ˈsaɪləns/
1. she escaped to the wilderness for silence: stillness, tranquility, noiselessness, peace
2. but there the gods kept silence: secretiveness, reticence, taciturnity, uncommunicativeness.
3. she was reduced to silence: speechlessness, wordlessness, dumbness, muteness.36 words of lent
Monday, February 22nd, 2010i’d like to be in the desert today
away from the clutter of expectations
unsolvable problems
irredeemable situationsi’d like to be where it’s barren
and I’m alonetoday i’d like to be thirsty
not drowning37 words of lent
Saturday, February 20th, 2010it would be too easy to
spend lent creating a desolate wilderness
even where none existsjust to make this mean something
this lent,
i’d like simply to be aware
of where i am,and nothing more.
38 words of lent
Friday, February 19th, 2010day three of giving up guilt
and anxietytheir space lies empty
begging to be cluttered with somethingi’d hoped it would be grace.
is lent discovering
that what we want
doesn’t come
simply because we need it?39 words of lent
Thursday, February 18th, 2010already regret
and it’s only day 2this is too easy
i don’t need faith to be in wilderness
i need faith to believe in the lush,
the rich,
the fertileis desolation what i should have given up?
40 words of Lent
Thursday, February 18th, 2010it begins again
but i need no god to make my wilderness
i find it of my own volitionas discipline this year
i give up nothing
but guiltthe road to crucifixion,
after all,
is paved with failed intentionson failing, again
Wednesday, February 17th, 2010I’m still thinking about failing – some gems I found today on Seth Godin’s website:
fail often. dream big and fail often.
you can’t have a lot of good ideas without generating a lot of bad onesI was thinking about failure in another context this morning. I’ve just started running. Those who know me understand how extraordinary this is. I’ve never been able to run. Not being able to run was as much a part of my identity as my curly hair, or my relentless overuse of the word ‘relentless’. It wasn’t that i needed to try harder, it was that my body wasn’t built for running. I’d start, and 30 seconds later I’d need to stop. But then i found a way for that 30 seconds to become 30 minutes… And inexplicably, unbelievably, what was once true [because 'i can't run' really was true] no longer is… which is disconcerting, bemusing, and completely lovely.
I was thinking when i was out this morning how, at school, running slowly was never an option. You ran to win. It was the people who were fast at running who did running – the rest of us did high jump or javelin or whatever – even if we were just as bad at that as we were at running. It’s been such a revelation to change the playing field, to realise that even though i’m not that fast, I’m actually pretty good at running. I’ve got good form, and i seem to adjust quickly to longer and longer distances.
I hate moralistic stories about trying harder. That’s not what this is. It’s about letting what was true no longer be true… and about how much something small like that changes everything about how we understand ourselves.
digging my way out of the chaos for a moment…
Thursday, February 11th, 2010[I just printed these ideas out and stuck them on my office wall: overcoming creative block]
i said last week that i’m making more at the moment than I’m writing, and that’s still the case. My office looks like an explosion of ideas, and none of them involve words. It’s lovely.
So there’ll be silence here for a bit longer… but things are great: the bushfire waiting space is still coming along nicely, the stuff for adelaide is gradually coming together, i’ve got an idea for a space in a gallery for holy week, the ‘between the spaces’ crew are meeting for drinks this weekend, easter is happening in the prison again, our little Culture and Context team are still amazing colleagues… I can’t believe how much work there is to do, and how much i’m loving doing it.
I’ll be back when there’s something to say…
it’s been a bit of a year
Thursday, February 4th, 2010It’s a year this sunday since the fires. The anticipation of a heartbreaking anniversary is often much worse than its reality, so i’m posting this today.
I’d thought i’d inevitably write something in honour of it – perhaps something about what we know now – but i realise that i don’t know anything, except that we’re human; frighteningly and amazingly human… and how foolish i was to think before last year that i knew what fragility and resilience looked like. And how foolish i am to imagine that because i’ve seen just a fragment of that humanness, fragility and resilience up close over the last year, that i even now have any knowledge of it.
So instead of words, just silence. and a prayer to something, someone – perhaps just to life itself – of both anger and gratitude that this is what being human is. And love to those who know that so much more than me.
jesus2000
Monday, February 1st, 2010very cool:
JESUS2000 from jesus 2000 on Vimeo.
precious
Monday, February 1st, 2010
Yesterday, quite unexpectedly, I ended up at both the Ron Mueck exhibition at the NGV, and then a pre-release showing of the movie Precious.
I’ve seen a lot of Ron Mueck’s pieces, in different places around the world, but nothing prepared me for what it would be like to see them together. His work is human sculptures, sometimes huge, sometimes tiny – all captured in what seem like transition moments; thin places, as such. I swear they have souls.
The review in the paper said that the crowd reaction was half the experience, and it was right. Normally when we come face to face with installations about humanity we don’t like what we see. We half turn away from it, and each other. I think it frightens us, maybe, or disgusts us… But people were walking around this one smiling, talking to each other. It was like this celebration of what connects us, rather than an avoidance of it. It’s hard to describe, but it’s different to how i’ve seen a crowd at an exhibition before.
Every time someone would approach one of the sculptures they would search out the eyes first and look into them. I did too. It was an unconscious, instinctive reaction. I think we were looking for wisdom or truth, and without being trite, it felt like we might have seen it.
[these photos were all taken on my phone - there are some great photos here]
–
Two older women, approaching ‘Youth‘:
W1: is that a stab wound?
W2: i think it’s from barbed wire.
W1: no he’s been stabbed.
[momentary pause]
W1: i hate it when young people wear their trousers so their underwear shows. do they do that in brisbane too?–
In the afternoon we went to see Precious, which opens in Melbourne this week. It’s as beautiful and confronting as all the reports say. One of those films you feel lucky to have seen – like a life you feel privileged to have witnessed. I was nervous it would be too Hollywood – that it would be a story about someone rescuing Precious from her life, but while she had her champions, and couldn’t have done it without them, it was always a story about her courage and her determination.This was the moment of the film that won me over. It was Precious’ first day at the new school. Her teacher Blu asks her to say something to the class:
Precious: I never talked in class before.
Blu: How did that make you feel?
Precious: Here. It made me feel like I was here.coming up this year…
Friday, January 29th, 2010I can’t wait to show you all the stuff we’ve been working on here, but it will need to wait a few weeks yet… but i’ve been super inspired this week by Kevin Cooley’s videos, these installations, and this paper work…
I thought I should check in and remind people of what’s coming up in the next few months. Firstly, I’m in Adelaide in the second week of March, joining Jonny Baker, Steve Taylor, Craig Mitchell and a host of others at a series of workshops and public installations entitled ‘Spirit of Wonder’, coinciding with the Adelaide Fringe Festival. More information can be found here. The title of the installation that Jonny and I are curating, with the help of people from SA, is The Landscape of Desire. It’s the loveliest theme to work with…
And applications for the 2010 UK Greenbelt and beyond trip close at the end of February. More information and a registration form are available here. This is shaping up to be better than ever… I really can’t wait.
faith isn’t faith…
Thursday, January 21st, 2010Luckily, a well placed silence is a great thing. The lack of posts here haven’t been deliberately crafted, just a result of making things rather than writing them. It’s been lovely.
I was in Adelaide on Tuesday, just for the day, doing some planning for the February event that Jonny Baker and I are curating. Craig Mitchell flashed a book in front of me, and the page I read included this quote that’s been reverberating in my thinking since:
‘Faith isn’t faith unless it involves a significant risk of failure…’
Which may mean that if we aren’t failing, we aren’t acting enough in faith… after all, success isn’t the primary result we look for; acting faithfully is.
And from Monday’s trip to Marysville and Kinglake, in the fog and hail:
never say a commonplace thing
Tuesday, January 12th, 2010My colleague Sarah sent me this link to an amazing blogpost about museums inviting public participation and response through the opportunity to write letters.
The last four points are fantastic advice to anyone thinking about curating responsive worship stations:
What makes these visitor response stations so successful?
- They force people to slow down. Whether you are working a typewriter or writing longhand at a writing desk, the overall experience implies focus, intent, and taking your time.
- They have an intended audience. When you write a letter to someone, even someone dead or fictitious, you know who you are writing to. You have a clear image of that person in your mind, and you are motivated by your desire to connect with them, not a general desire to express yourself.
- They imply a response. When you send someone a letter, it’s the beginning of a conversation. In the case of the John Murray Archive exhibition, staff continue that conversation. In the other two examples, while visitors don’t receive a response, they have opened up a mental conversation with Snoopy or Jack Kerouac to continue at their leisure.
- All of these stations were well-designed to fit into the overall exhibit experience. Letter-writing was the heart of John Murray’s enterprise. The typewriter was central to both Snoopy and Jack Kerouac’s stories. These visitor response stations were natural to the stories being told, and they were designed thoughtfully using the same kinds of tools as those that produced artifacts on display. The response stations allowed visitors to stay within the emotional space of the exhibits rather than wresting them out into a generic comment board or book.If I were to distil everything i’ve learnt about curating stations it would come down to this: make sure the response arises from the installation, rather than simply being a predictable action [never get people lighting candles just because people like lighting candles...]; leave things unfinished and questions unanswered, so it relies on participation to continue the story; make it as personal and relevant as possible, recognising that each person has a story that they want to be told…
angels
Thursday, January 7th, 2010Ross and I went into Port Phillip as planned on christmas day… I took the printed orders of service complete with their carols, only to discover that the cd player that was going to accompany the singing was commandeered by the catholics who were leading a service in the mainstream chapel [which was fair, it's their cd player]… ‘Well,’ i said, with much more enthusiasm than i felt, ‘we’re going to sing anyway. The worst that can happen is that it’s a disaster.’
I’ve learnt, over the last few months, that the expected never happens. I’m used to the significant moment in the worship being when we light the candles, or when we’ve finally finished all the words, and after the blessing there’s a long period of silence. That’s the point at which peace seems to descend. But this time it was in the a’capella renditions of ‘Away in the manger’ and ‘Silent night’ – songs chosen in the hope that the men who can’t read would at least know the first verses, and could simply repeat them as often as the carols required. They did. And we stumbled through the verses with infinitely more enthusiasm than ability, stopping between them to listen to the loudspeaker announcements about medication, breakfast, and the morning program… Forget any cathedral children’s choir, in spite of it being hopelessly out of tune and out of time, I have a hunch this was as close to angels singing as you could ever hope to hear.
I still don’t think we could sing on any other day but christmas – but there’s something about christmas in the prison that makes everyone who’s at the service determined to make it work. And perhaps there’s something about being used to having no dignity that lets you sing as though no one is listening. In most of the events that I’m part of, I assume that my ‘audience’ is cynical – that i will have to break through that cynicism in order for people to engage. I think the cynicism is justified [though perhaps i'm justifying my own by saying that!] – we’ve been offered cheap cliches and hackneyed promises too often – but i’ve also realised it’s a luxury of those for whom faith is an option. In the prison, the men are on side from the moment we walk in the door. They want – need? – it to work much more than i do, which makes, as i’ve said before, an overwhelming responsibility. They’ll search out the moment of transcendence in the most awkward of liturgies. Just the fact that we’ve turned up means it’s christmas… People kept insinuating that i was doing something noble by going into the prison on christmas day, but in reality it’s hard to imagine anything more humbling, or any role more privileged. How very lucky i am.
night lights
Wednesday, January 6th, 2010This made me very happy today
In this installation YesYesNo teamed up with The Church, Inside Out Productions and Electric Canvas to turn the Auckland Ferry Building into an interactive playground. Our job was to create an installation that would go beyond merely projection on buildings and allow viewers to become performers, by taking their body movements and amplifying them 5 stories tall.
[watch the flash on the website - it's gorgeous]
stay awake to the world
Monday, January 4th, 2010In the darkest places, you discover you are real to yourself and one another. And if you’re not called – mercifully – to such places, you will need disciplines of thinking and imagination to keep yourself real: to fight off easy answers, false gods, stifling systems. Prayer is one such discipline, essential and focal for people of faith; but there are others. We can still choose honesty or dishonesty. We can still choose what Chesterton called the ‘easy speeches that comfort cruel men’; or we can choose to face how vulnerable we all are and how much we need to fight against our fear of one other if trust and hope and love are to prevail when all is done. The challenge is how we stay awake to how the world is – and to how it can yet be changed.
- Rowan Williams
How I would like to live this year: choosing honesty; choosing to face how vulnerable we all are; choosing to stay awake to the world.
light in the darkness – christmas day in the prison
Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009
The story tells us
that it’s those who wait in the world’s shadows
who are the first to know of the Christ-child,
born into darkness
bringing great light.So we gather as those who carry the rumour of peace
and the truth of love
into a world longing for light.
We gather as those who pray for the justice
another is waiting for,
who speak the hope another needs to breathe.This is a pdf of the handout for Christmas day in the prison… there’s a reflection in the middle which isn’t included in the handout, which is made up of questions – what do you need to hear from the story [that the birth of God is told first to those who the world would least trust and believe? that love can be born even when it seems impossible?], and what do you need to say yes to [the gift of peace? the promise of justice?].
And yes, we’re singing – which i suspect will be a monumental disaster! But the lovely thing about doing stuff in the prison is that the men are much more forgiving than any other group i’ve worked with…
becoming storytellers
Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009it’s hard to imagine a better trio of storytellers to learn from… Julie Perrin, Jeanette Acland and Christina Rowntree are offering this opportunity at the beginning of next year…
Do you wonder about how to enliven the stories you tell in your ministry setting? Would you like to spend time learning the storyteller’s craft? There are techniques that will help you tell stories with confidence and keep your audience interested! Great storytellers do practice their craft and spend time rehearsing. Three local storytellers are willing to share their secrets with you and help you find your authentic voice.
At the very start of 2010 we are offering Becoming Storytellers, where we will immerse ourselves in sacred stories, learn memory aides, embody the story and tell to each other. There will also be opportunities for individual coaching during the course. Stories will be drawn from the Bible and beyond, and Godly Play will be introduced as one of several story forms.
The course is presented primarily as an introduction for school chaplains, children and family workers, ministers and others who seek to tell sacred stories. Previous participants have found greater confidence and courage to tell stories. Here’s what they say:
“Great presenters, loved their art! I have picked up some skills and feel confident to use them….”
“I would do this course again because there was so much valuable content….”
“I would recommend this course to others….”
“Well planned, well delivered, well received!”Becoming Storytellers begins with a Story Immersion on Friday 29 and Saturday 30 January, then continues over five Wednesday evenings in February, and culminates in a shared telling on Wednesday 3 March.
Venue: Centre for Theology and Ministry, 1 Morrison Close, Parkville
Cost: $395 for early birds who register before 18 December, or $420.00 by 15 January, 2010
Maximum Participant Numbers: 16
Led by: Julie Perrin, Jeanette Acland and Christina Rowntree
Register your interest: please contact info@ctm.uca.edu.au for a brochure. Enquiries to chris.rowntree@ctm.uca.edu.au or phone 03 9340 8813longing for night
Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009i long for night
for the darkness to claim the light
so i can rest from hiding from the gaze of the world
the cracks and dirt of my lifei long for night
to no longer be able to see
where i end
and the shadows begini long for night
for the whispered confidences
that can be shared only when the harsh light of day
can’t mock their half known truthi long for night
for the hours of sleeping
where i do not need to know
or be, or do, or have.this is the longest day.
i pray the night will come.the waiting space
Monday, December 21st, 2009I think I’ve mentioned a couple of times that we have been designing waiting space advent installations for a couple of the temporary accommodation villages in the parts of Victoria that were devastated by bushfires last summer. It’s been a bit of a slow process – waiting until funding comes through, waiting until we can set up meetings, waiting until diaries get empty…
In the next couple of weeks we’ll be delivering postcards to people at Kinglake and Marysville. They have a short introduction to the concept, a reflection, and then space for response – inviting people to finish the sentences ‘Waiting for…’ and ‘Grateful for…’. Their responses will be integrated into the next part of the space. This is different to how we imagined, but a few weeks ago we went to talk with people in the villages about our ideas for creating a waiting space, and they offered the same feedback in the two villages: they told us that a waiting space was important, but they also thought a space for gratefulness was just as important. So we’re integrating the two into the installation, in different ways.
I’ve been a bit anxious [i like to find things to worry about] that the added time for consultation and development has meant that we will miss the advent period… but of course, the waiting doesn’t finish just because christmas is over. In fact, the lack of resolution of the waiting becomes even more poignant after Christmas… living through all the build up to find that nothing much seems to have changed. But much as we sometimes think it does, the christian calendar doesn’t create the world’s reality – just because it’s Christmas doesn’t mean the world has hope… but it seems this space fits quite beautifully within a post-christmas world: trying to honour the tension between promise and reality in a world that makes recognising either so desperately impossible.
I don’t know how much of what we do I will put up here. It’s not really my story to tell, and the space doesn’t need advertising [and the people living in the villages don't need to be the focus of anyone's attention!]. But we’re incredibly grateful to the Share Appeal for funding it, and to the different artists / designers / chaplains etc who have made it possible…
unwrap our darkness
Sunday, December 20th, 2009
Jonny has posted a really lovely advent movie, using footage he made of sky lanterns at the Big Chill festival with words from a prayer I wrote a few years ago. I’d use it on christmas eve, i think. He’s made it available as a free download on vimeo – and proost subscribers can download from the Proost site. And let me put in a plug for Proost again – a subscription is extraordinary value, especially with the Australian dollar being so good at the moment…
if there isn’t a god, we need to invent one fast
Friday, December 18th, 2009I went into the prison last night to do worship with the men. All week i’ve had Ben Bell’s image of Mary sitting by my desk. She’s challenged every word I write. It’s been a nice way to work.
Last night I had long conversations with a couple of the men, both of which i’ve been contemplating since. One brought home to me again the complexity of life, and the impossibility of redemption: he’s an older guy, in his early fifties, been in and out of prison for his adult life – the longest stretch out is 2 years 3 months, and this 12 year sentence is his longest stretch in. He’s due for release in a year or so. He’s one of the people I meet in prison who would scare me on the outside – but inside, I’ve had the chance to learn to like him. He sat next to me and we watched the tv for a while. We talked a bit about the week, and after a while he said, It’s killing me in here. It’s doing my head in. I asked what it was that did that – it’s the grind of the every day, he said. It’s the same, for the whole of my life. I can’t wait to be out of here. I asked him what he planned to do when he got out, and he talked about the bender he was planning to go on, and then about the safe he was going to rob. He caught my look, and answered it: crime’s the only thing I know how to do, he said. To which I replied with the obvious truth: but you’re no good at crime, you keep getting caught. And as I said it, i realised the deeper truth. This is home, he said, confirming it. I don’t belong anywhere else.
If the impossibility of his life isn’t enough to make you cry when you’re driving home down Bell Street, I don’t know what would.
searching for the faith
Thursday, December 17th, 2009We’re using this this afternoon in Port Phillip Prison…
Perhaps this Christmas you are searching for the peace that Mary found -
the peace that let her have the world believe whatever it wanted about her;
the peace that came from believing that God’s story of love
might be told through her too.Perhaps you are searching for the joy that Mary found -
the joy that came from knowing that such an unexpected, unwanted event in her life
could somehow be turned into a much greater story
which would speak love into a broken world
and bring justice to those who have been oppressed.Perhaps you are searching for the courage that Mary found -
the courage to say to the world
‘I might know where God is to be found
and i might know how God can be made real’Perhaps you are searching for the faith that Mary found –
to believe that God might want to bring something divine to life in you:
love, perhaps,
grace,
forgiveness.Whether you are searching for peace, joy, courage or faith,
Mary’s story lets us believe it might happen
in the most impossible places
and through the most unexpected people…It means we can know with faith that God’s story,
brought to life once by a single pregnant teenager,
might be brought to life again by us here.the impact of imprisonment on the community
Wednesday, December 16th, 2009This was a great article in yesterday’s Age on our community’s instinct response to imprison criminals. From the article, written by Marie Segrave and Bree Carlton:
The challenge for anyone interested in asking these questions is the accusation of ”going soft on crime”. Those who are concerned about the welfare and human rights of prisoners are represented as ”do gooders” who ignore the ”fact” that many of these individuals are beyond rehabilitation and redemption; many have committed terrible crimes and there are victims who continue to suffer as a consequence of these crimes…
Women represent a notable case in point. Nationally women comprise the fastest-growing population in the prison community and between 2008 and 2009 the rate at which Victorian women are imprisoned has increased by 25 per cent, the highest level since the 19th century. The majority of women incarcerated in Victoria have been convicted for non-violent, drug-related offences, or are imprisoned as a consequence of fine default or welfare fraud. Many have committed crimes as a direct result of poverty and trauma. Women in prison are not generally violent or destructive individuals who present a threat to the community. Many have also been the subject of victimisation and are members of the most economically and socially marginalised communities in our state.
Women who come into contact with the criminal justice system are often homeless; have experienced familial dysfunction, childhood sexual abuse and/or domestic violence; experience problems with substance addiction and abuse; suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder or mental illness that is undiagnosed or untreated; have poor physical health and/or a disability; have been made wards of the state early in their lives; and are often sole parents and have experienced the removal of their own children whether by the state or as a result of violent intimate relationships…
It’s Christmas and How to make gravy, Paul Kelly’s imagining of a man’s letter from inside prison, resonates. It calls us to remember that while we celebrate the season and are distracted by short-term media cycles, there are practices of justice, sentencing and imprisonment that are becoming more firmly entrenched with each passing day, with consequences we have so far largely ignored.
in the space
Tuesday, December 15th, 2009the missing verses between Luke 2:6 and Luke 2:7
and in the space
between the full stop
and the capital letter
lies the untold story of
the birth of a babyof the first moment she guessed it was starting
an unfamiliar pain
the rush of fluid
the cramping force
halting and hesitant
then fierce and determinedin the space between the full stop
and the capital letter
lies the moment she told him
it’s time
and he realised he’d never believed
that it was realin the space between the full stop
and the capital letter
lies hours of screaming
terrifying
heart-stopping
blood-curdling
pain
till her fingers dig into the dirt
of the floor
and the wood
of the wall
and the skin
of his hand
and she wondered
he wondered
how she would
survivein the space between the full stop
and the capital letter
lies his breathless anticipation
the worry when it all begins
that it will never end
that it will all go wrong
when it’s taking too long
and then it’s happening too fast
and then suddenly the desperation of the last final
push
and the rush
of the blood
and the fluid
and the baby
oh – the baby
slippery and sweet
and screaming
thank godin the space between the full stop
and the capital letter
lies the bloodied body of the new born christ
a boy
and did they wonder at his eyelashes
and his tiny lips
and did they breathe with relief
that the God born from her womb
was normal
with real tears
and a heartbeatand did they wish the space
between the full stop
and the capital letter
were longer
that the story we know
ended there
and that the world lost interest
at the end of one sentence
so the next wouldn’t have to begin…for all we know
Tuesday, December 15th, 2009
We’ll use this image by Ben Bell, alongside a version of the poem below on Thursday in the prison…
For all we know,
before Mary sang her song of joy
she wept tears of frustration
despair
and heartbreak.I like to think she did.
For all we know,
before Mary welcomed God’s action with delight,
she fought what was happening to her
and she resented the presumption
of the divine.For all we know,
for at least a moment
and probably longer,
Mary was bewildered,
distraught
and lost.The miracle we celebrate today
may somehow seem more impossible
than the idea that Mary got pregnant
or that God became human.
It’s that in the face of devastation
and from deep within the truth of heartbreak and desolation
there might still come
unbidden
a moment of joy.deviations from the norm
Tuesday, December 15th, 2009I spent yesterday at Narana with a group of people from the United Aboriginal and Islander Christian Congress [UAICC], working on some communication and education resources for some presentations they will be doing next year.
Have I mentioned I love my job?
When i got home last night I read this book review on Jonny’s blog about Steve Bevans’ book, An Introduction to Theology in Global Perspective. Yesterday we’d been talking about the belief that God’s spirit was present in the land before Christianity arrived with the white people, and about the complexity of communicating that with people who believe that salvation begins and ends with the revelation of Jesus. While I was listening to the conversation it occurred to me again how weird it is that we are guided in our theology by those with doctorates, rather than by those who rely on the theology for their survival. I was reminded of Sallie McFague’s idea of deviations from the norm [which i've talked about before]… and how at christmas we are reminded that God is born from the womb of an unmarried middle eastern girl, not from the head of a middle-class, educated western theologian. And I wonder why, at christmas, we don’t search out more unmarried pregnant middle eastern girls to hear what God is doing now…
I was reminded again of that in the prison last week – it’s the conversion i always have there. I could quite happily do without faith, myself. And I’d really rather not have it. But I’m convicted of its necessity by the people who rely on it simply to survive. And they are the ones who remind me what God can and can’t do. They disabuse me of my fantasies and clever thoughts. And the best i can hope i offer is that God is made real in the space between us when we do the things that faith does.
I was about to buy Steve Bevans’ book when i realised the irony of that. So instead I’ve ordered some more indigenous theology, to broaden what i’ve already read… so i start listening again to the voices i find hardest to hear, in order to have even the smallest confidence that what i say and write has any credibility at all.
back soon
Thursday, December 3rd, 2009i’ll be away for the next week, moving back into my apartment. I’m sure it will be lovely to be back there, but I’m going to miss this view from my balcony…
christmas resources
Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009I’ve added Christmas services from previous years into the Resources and Downloads section of the Worship in Prison page of this site [click on the Worship in Prison link above]. If they’re helpful, please feel free to use and adapt…
an embryo of hope
Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009for Port Phillip Prison tomorrow… still to be tweaked
We’ll be laying out a different image of the balloon girl in the centre of the worship space – towards the end of the service we’ll invite the men to light tealights and place them on the balloons… i love this image, but couldn’t find it in high res so we’re going to print it out small to give to each of the men with the following meditation attached. The bible reading will be Luke 1:26-38
there are few things more fragile
than an embryo of hopegiven its chance of life only by those who say ‘yes’
to its promiselike the prophets who said yes to God’s urging
Mary who said yes to an angel
and Joseph who said yes to his Marylike the people of faith through all of time
who have said yes to the promise of loveand as we sit by the side of our wall
- whatever that wall might be –
surrounded by the rubble and rubbish
of broken dreams and liveswhat faith does it take to imagine
an embryo of hope
being brought to life here?what ‘yes’ are you able to say
for it to be born in our world?Monday, November 30th, 2009
It’s just turned December
and the air is already thick with promises of love
and words of justice, hope and peace.But promises can be made easily
by those who do not know the cost of their failure;
who do not know how cruel it is
to have love lie just out of our reach.So if a promise of love would destroy you this advent
let having faith simply mean this:we will let the idea of love be possible
and we will live so that one day it is.when advent isn’t about waiting
Monday, November 30th, 2009i’m preparing a meditation for Port Phillip Prison on Thursday night – the first in a series I’m doing there through December.
Last year we focussed the service around the question ‘what are you waiting for?’ – and i realised after getting about 15 seconds into the first service that what we were doing was actually terribly cruel and unhelpful. For many of the men it’s too painful to acknowledge what they’re waiting for, because they know how fragile its possibility is. Instead of that they obsess with the unrealistic dream – dreaming of that won’t hurt them in the same way that believing their lives will be different can.
I think faith is not about trusting that things will be alright in the future, but believing that this moment does not define us or our future… So this year I think we’ll ask the question about how faith changes this moment we’re living in [i like the immediacy that advent provokes: for the future to be changed, this moment must be changed - and we need to be part of that preparation for the birth of hope and love]. So advent will be less a time of waiting and more a time of actively participating in creating a different possibility for life right now.
perhaps, in prison anyway, the faithful question in advent is not ‘what are you waiting for?’ but ‘how do i need to live now for hope to have its birth?’
It’s just turned December
and the air is already thick with promises of love
and words of justice, hope and peace.But promises can be made easily
by those who do not know the cost of their failure;
who do not know how cruel it is
to have love lie just out of our reach.So if a promise of love would destroy you this advent
let having faith simply mean this:we will let the idea of love be possible
and we will live so that one day it is.Friday, November 27th, 2009
We are so easily mesmerised by the flicker of the flame
and dazzled by the brightness of the lights
that shine in your nameYet your light comes not to overwhelm
but to illuminate the world around us,
so that we will see the deep cracks and stains
that mark the foundations and walls of our community.Dare we pray for the faith of advent?
to pray for your coming
even though we know
that we will never look at the world
with the same eyes
again.the futile gesture
Friday, November 27th, 2009Taken on the phone, around the corner from home…
